Lessons

When I tell people this, they tell me I’m the strongest person they know and that they are certain my resilience will break through all of it. Depending on the person, I sometimes just barely confess the truth I’m feeling at my core, that I’m not as certain.

Perhaps the reason I don’t ask is because I’m afraid that it has more to do with them, than me. Maybe deep down, I can’t conceive that I’m irreplaceable when so many have walked away and lived their lives without bother.

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Equanimity means looking at things objectively like a scientist should, rather than emotionally. We know that scientists should be objective about their work, because if they are emotional, then they are likely to see things which are not there and miss things that are there. If a scientist badly wants a specific result (to be right; self-fulfilling prophecy), he or she is much more likely to make such mistakes. We do the same thing when we badly want something.

EXAMPLE: A woman who has been in and out of a number of relationships and each one of her partners was supposed to be the answer to her dreams. This woman is addicted to falling in love and imagines she will be truly happy with the next man she meets. She will fall wild in love again. She is so desperate to have her dream fulfilled that she does not really see her partners for what they are, only for the ways in which they meet her dream. She is shocked when she is forced to realize each time that her partners were not what she had thought they were. Eventually, the woman stops to investigate what “the dream”is all about. She wants love, but has not been skilled at recognizing it. Learning equanimity will be a big part of her being able to see potential partners in both their good and bad aspects. She becomes less and less desperate for a relationship; to prove she is ok. She begins to choose her partners with more wisdom.

When we find ourselves feeling angry, or needy, or desperately wanting something, or depressed, or jealous, or whatever, then equanimity is the way to step aside from these emotions.

That is what equanimity does: It looks at the pain without exaggerating its effects and consequences. It takes a balanced view

— chönyi taylor, ENOUGH!

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Recently it has occurred to me that the only person who ever really knows you, is you. We exist in people’s minds as their own perception and that perception is based on their own beliefs and life experiences. People always fear what they don’t know. I watch as so many try to make things fit into little, tidy boxes which they can fit into their lives, but rarely do they ever try to discover and understand. There’s a large piece of me that wonders if this lack of putting ourselves in others shoes, compassion, is because there are too many shoes now.

Our world view used to be compromised of our family, friends, neighbors and colleagues. We belonged to one another. We watched out for one another. As the internet superhighway revealed new landscapes, cultures, people and problems, it seemed as if we were evolving to a greater sense of stake in humanity, but somewhere, something happened. I don’t know if we have become desensitized from exposure, or lazy and label-reliant.

Why do we so often jump to a label and why the hell would we think that any label could be all-encompassing of every fiber of a human being’s existence?

All of these words have a different meaning because we all have different perspectives.

For example, seeing someone as a traitor is not an absolute truth, even if everyone believes it.

Another example, hearing something about someone you “know” and thinking, “That’s not the person I know.” This, on the other hand, is actually true.

This is why you should question everything you’re told, even if you heard it from me.

The most interesting take away from all of this has been discovering what people think of me and realizing that it almost always has nothing to do me. It’s their perception and if you pay attention you learn WAY more about the other person before they’d ever have a clue they’d given themselves away.

It’s slowly becoming the most frightening and exhilarating discovery of my life.